Warrant: Nurse Tried To Make Woman, Infant Into His Sex Slaves

November 21, 2012|By DAVID OWENS, dowens@courant.com, The Hartford Courant

VERNON — Detectives have been chasing down new leads received in their investigation of Jay T. Mohler-Avery, a nurse practitioner accused of trying to sexually assault an 18-month-old child last month.

Mohler-Avery, 44, of Hartford, has been in custody with bail set at $1 million since his arrest Oct. 28 on attempted sexual assault, attempted risk of injury to a minor and conspiracy charges.

Lt. Bill Meier said detectives have received new leads as a result of media attention to the case.

"We will be following up with these people," Meier said Wednesday. "We've been talking to people right along."

Details of the case against Mohler-Avery emerged Tuesday after a sealing order on police reports and search warrants related to his case expired.

Mohler-Avery had a family practice called CT Family Care LLC at the Vernon Professional Building, 281 Hartford Turnpike.

According to the court files, Mohler-Avery and a codefendant were arrested after police say they tried to take delivery of an 18-month-old girl so that Mohler-Avery could sexually assault her. Mohler-Avery, according to police and court records, believed he'd convinced a patient to move into his Hartford home with her four daughters so that they could all become his sex slaves. The woman is 32 and her children are 9, 6, 3 and 18 months.

In exchange for being his sex slaves, Mohler-Avery offered to provide for the woman and her daughters for the rest of their lives. He planned to eventually move them from his Hartford home, which is in foreclosure, to what he called his "compound" in Maine, according to court records.

He first wanted to have sexual contact with the 18-month-old, according to the warrant, so he could "break her in early."

Police had been investigating Moher-Avery for about two weeks and had audio recordings of some of his conversations with the woman when they set in motion a sting to take him into custody. As Hurricane Sandy bore down on Connecticut, Vernon detectives had the woman agree to turn over the 18-month-old at a place in Vernon. Officers were waiting as Candace Merriam, 46, who lived and worked with Mohler-Avery, arrived in Mohler-Avery's pickup truck to pick up the child.

Instead police were waiting. Mohler-Avery was arrested about the same time at his home in Hartford.

Later, during an interview, Merriam told police she'd met Mohler-Avery in Augusta, Maine, and known him about six years. She said that Mohler-Avery had sent her to pick up the 18-month-old, but she insisted she did not know why. She did acknowledge she was present when the woman and Mohler-Avery talked about his interest in sexually assaulting the child, according to the court file.

Merriam told Det. Steve Sartor she was having difficulty telling him about Mohler-Avery because without Mohler-Avery, she would have no home or job. She then said she did not want to talk anymore and asked for a lawyer. Mohler-Avery did not talk to detectives, but immediately asked for a lawyer.

Mohler-Avery, according to the court records, was concerned about being recorded, and at one point told the woman that the FBI could record conversations even if cellular phones were turned off. During several conversations with the woman, Mohler-Avery had her remove batteries from her cell phone. He did the same. What Mohler-Avery did not know, however, was that the woman had concealed other phones and recording devices on her so that she could record the conversations for police.

Mohler-Avery has been jailed since his arrest on charges of attempted first-degree sexual assault, conspiracy to commit first-degree sexual assault, attempted risk of injury to a minor and conspiracy to commit risk of injury to a minor.

Anyone with information is asked to call Vernon police at 860-872-9126.

Vernon police began investigating the allegations against Mohler-Avery when the patient, a woman who was not identified in court papers, told police Mohler-Avery told her and her husband during a medical appointment that if they had any more children he'd "take it off their hands," according to the warrant.

He clarified that he was interested only in a newborn daughter and offered a free 12-month stay in a three-bedroom condominium, according to the warrant.

They woman and her husband were not sure Mohler-Avery was serious, and at a subsequent medical appointment, Mohler-Avery offered to let her and her children move in with him, the warrant says. After making the woman remove her bra to ensure that she was not wearing a recording device, she told police, he explained the offer further.

"He offered to financially support her and her children for the rest of their lives in exchange for [the woman] being his 'domestic slave,'" according to the warrant. A domestic slave, he explained to her, would maintain the home and satisfy his sexual needs whenever he wanted.

He also indicated that they would have to have sex regardless of who else was in the room, including her children, according to the warrant.